This episode of the Poor Man's Pinball Podcast is brought to you by Flip N Out Pinball. Why would you go anywhere else? Get all your brand new pinball games, accessories, raw thrills, escaleras at Flip N Out Pinball. Call 812-457-9711. I am so excited I got my GNR LE today. Can't wait to unbox it, set it up, and experience that awesome concert in a box. Zach and Nicole, a very special thank you from me to you for all your support of the Poor Man's Pinball Podcast and the Poor Man's Pinball Network. So once again, that number is 812-457-9711. Zach and Nicole will take care of you. We are also brought to you by pinballprices.com. Doc Finlay, tribe member, father, entrepreneur. Go to pinballprices.com. Check out all the new prices that he logs in each and every day. pinballprices.com see what your pinball is worth today and don't forget to hit that donate button on pinballprices.com and buy doc a beer welcome to the poor man's pinball podcast episode 117 i am flying solo once again Just wanted to catch up with all you guys and girls out in pinball land. What are we going to talk about today? Not a whole lot going on in the news, at least that I'm aware of. But my game room, it's coming together. So we're going to talk a little bit about that. What else do we have going on today? Oh, I don't know. I just got GNRLE. It came today. I'm staring at it right now. It's in my living room. I took it out of the box and it's just there. and it's taunting me because I want to open it up. I want to play it. The Escalera has not arrived, unfortunately. A whole other story. But Tribe member Eric is coming over later tonight and he's going to help me schlep it downstairs. So super excited about that. The game room is almost complete. So let's just run through the games I have down there for all you guys who are interested. And if you're not interested, eh, don't care. We got Shadow. once again Jeremy Schmitz gave me a soundboard for my shadow because mine was beyond repair so I'm still looking for a replacement for it but Jeremy Schmitz tribe member was kind enough to loan me his for a while so shadows up and running I've been playing that actually the most since these games have been down there the next in the lineup we have Star Wars comic edition premium that's probably the second most game second game I've been playing the most number two I guess then we have Ghostbusters Pro then we have Simpsons Pinball Party then we have Spider-Man two classic Steve Ritchie games both with great flow it's awesome, love that game, that's one of my favorite sterns, really really really enjoy Spider-Man what's next to that, then we have Earthshaker then we have mouse and around so that is one entire row so this is exciting because instead of having all these games crammed in a room that is one single row then on the other side i have my sorcerer and my fireball home edition which really doesn't count i've been told but you know what it's down there we're calling it a game but that's that's the other bank i guess um Um, so anyways, when we get GNR down there, GNR is going to be first, it's going to take the place of the shadow and see all the cool art when you walk downstairs and then the shadow is going to go, um, to the other side. So interesting thing about the other side. I don't know if I've discussed this before, but it's, it's kind of a, it's a poor man's special. What can I say? Um, you know, we, we did a great job with this basement. I love how it looks. I loved how it turned out. As always, you wish you had a little more room, you know, and a couple of things you would do differently. And in this particular case, I couldn't have really done anything too much different just with the space constraints. But what happened was the other side, which doesn't have all the seven games on it, there is a cold air return for the furnace. So obviously we're not moving that. That's got to stay right. so when when i did my measurements it's like okay we can squeeze games underneath these this cold air return um but what i didn't really take into consideration was once we dry walled it in because we actually boxed it in and dry walled it in put some outlets up there it's you know it looks it looks great um certain games i.e stern pros like stern new stern games do not fit underneath there they're they're just too tall and when i say like too tall we're talking about like literally an inch so sorcerer fits under there fine we got shadow under there fine you know so a lot of these older games um will fit not all of them though like you know um mouse and around is actually taller so mouse and around won't fit under there so it kind of sucks because it limits me a little bit i mean i'm not complaining you know i'm gonna have 10 games down there they're all going to fit. They all look great. Um, but going forward, you know, if, if I want any more games, I'm going to have to kind of determine how, how they're going to fit because the other side with the seven games and you can only fit seven, you can't fit any more. Um, you know, I can put anything. I can even put toppers there because there's the full eight feet. I think it's a, yeah, eight, eight and a half foot basement. Um, so that's good. But the other side, a little tight, I'll, I'll, I'll take some pictures. I'll put them up on the poor man's pinball fan page, But just thought, you know, that's just another poor man drew thing, like not planning ahead. And here we are. But once again, you know, the space was limited down there. I think we did a really good job. You know, we had to get my wife in office because she's working from home. I think I mentioned that because that whole office of hers, which, by the way, is like 10 by 10. So, you know, it's a pretty large room, 11. What is it? 11 by 10, I think it was. That was all going to be my space as well. But then she gets this great job. so of course I can't tell her no now we have to build her this office in the basement so you know it is what it is but everybody's happy I have my game she has her office she has a great new job and our lives are going very very very well so you know a little bit of a brag there but it's not about the games and and the money or whatever it's just that we're really happy so I just I like to share that you know because it it about the happiness it about the life balance And we have a lot of balance now and we enjoying a lot more things that we haven done in the past But enough about that We want to talk about the games We want to talk about the game room Yeah, just really enjoying it and looking forward to having some people over, playing some games, doing some more recordings down there, having some podcast stuff, having some Facebook Live stuff. I think my first Facebook Live, which I'm hoping to do later this week or early next week, will be a little tour of the game room. I've been spending a little money just kind of buying some odds and ends, some different little signage and things. I bought a game room sign, which I think is pretty cool, with the arrow. What else did I buy? I bought a Stern pinball neon light, which is fricking awesome. And almost every day, Kathleen says to me, did you buy X? And I just laugh. And I said, you know what? If I were you, I would be really concerned if I wasn't buying X because, you know, she says it all the time. She married a 12-year-old boy or married a 14-year-old boy, and she's right. You know, I've never grown up. I don't want to grow up. I do what I'm supposed to do. I earn some money. I take care of my family. And then the rest of my time is spent fucking around, having fun. So that's what I like to do. And she knew what she got into. She knew what this was when we got married. So, you know, jokes on her. But here we are. No, she's been really supportive. And this GNR is a great example. and how this came to be was um i know i've been hemming and hawing about gnr you know i loved it i wasn't sure about it i loved it again wasn't so sure about it then i go to expo with joe hood and ari and have the most amazing time playing it um you know so it was growing on me growing on me but it was one of those things that i had godzilla on order you know i have venom on order um so i'm I'm just like, well, I'm kind of set for this year, potentially next year as well, because I'm not going to buy all these games, and now I'm running out of room as well. So anyways, I bought Sorcerer in the fall, and I did the whole restore, and that was great. That was like the last game I bought, and I was kind of itching for a new, new game, and I was really hoping to get Godzilla. So I reached out to Zach. We talked a bit, and I just said, hey, I know there's this run in March. I said, we're probably not getting there. What about May? He said, yeah, I don't even know about May because, you know, he's still working on some of these day one orders and whatever. So I said, okay, cool. And then I just said, well, do you have anything in stock? And he said, yeah, I have GNR. So right away my ears perked up and I said, you know, maybe this is the time. So this was so cool on Kathleen because I just, I told her about Godzilla and I said, I know we talked about it. He said it was fine. But I'm like, it might not be here till late this year or even early next year. I said, we can get a GNR now. And then, you know, when Godzilla comes around, we can look at selling something or, you know, figure out how to make room for it. And in the most amazing way, Kathleen just said, okay. And I thought there was a catch because she didn't ask how much it was. she didn't ask when it was coming. You know, the only thing she does these days now is she makes fun of me for the Escalera and almost every day or at least a couple times a week she'll say, oh, is the Escalera showing up today? And she just thinks she's the funniest person in the world. So I guess that's why we're married because, you know, a lot of times I think I'm the funniest person in the world even though my jokes are terrible. So, you know, once again, I don't need to ask my wife to buy games but um you know i feel like i should um especially because if one comes home and she doesn't know about it it usually causes a little bit of an issue so i like to pre-empt our fights you know kind of kind of get ahead of it if you will um but no this one was great and you know we haven't really had any issues about games in quite some time um now she's just back to you know you're an idiot and I'm like yep you're right um but no she's she's been super supportive and uh we are all including her I think she's going to hang out with us a little bit at MGC she certainly won't be there all weekend but I am really really looking forward to the Midwest Gaming Classic so we only have a couple more weeks um I'm going to bring Sorcerer because I'm so proud of it and um you know it's it's a fun game and it looks great so a couple a couple little blemishes There's some cabinet stuff I could probably still work on, but I think all in all it looks amazing. I got some custom apron cards made for it, and it just really, really turned out nice. And I don't know if we – I know I've been talking about it. I don't know if I really went into detail about all the work that went into it, but maybe I'll do like a separate podcast and kind of go through, you know, not step by step, but kind of go through everything I did for all the tech nerds out there and the people that restore games. But I want to thank just everyone along the way who helped me with questions or just giving me some encouragement. Like Dave Jeff Brenner told me that video looked pretty good, and he thought I did a really good job on it. So hearing that from somebody like him is amazing because, yeah, it definitely is not perfect. I definitely made a lot of mistakes, but it was a great learning experience, and I will do it again. And, yeah, I think I did a pretty good job, and it was a really, really big project. But back to MGC, I just wanted to kind of do a little roster check here and the people who are coming and talk about some people, you know, preemptively about who I want to see and maybe haven't seen in a while or talked to in a while. so we actually um we are going to have a pretty good tribe turnout um so i kind of i have this list of the tribe in front of me and i kind of got who i think is going to be there so let's just kind of run down um we got tribe member number one ryan kuiper he's uh he's local here so he'll be there and him and i haven't talked that much um he's been busy i don't know if you guys saw on facebook but um ryan kuiper is well he's not but his wife is pregnant with their third child so So insert applause. Congratulations, Ryan. And I think they just celebrated their anniversary as well. So great great great stuff Great news Congratulations to Ryan and Sue on their third baby That is absolutely amazing Martin listener number 15 He had moved to Wisconsin a year or so ago, and he will be at MGC. So I'll be excited to see him again. We saw him at Expo last year, and he will be at MGC. So looking forward to that. um ebw eric tribe member eric he's actually coming over tonight to help me with gnr but he will be at mgc as well mike williams he is one of the volunteers there he will definitely be at mgc he'll be helping get games get in and out you know for the whole weekend he always does an amazing job with that um glenn Glenn Waechter will not be there glenn we're gonna miss you um sean frayden he said he's i think he's driving up for one day he's from illinois so i'm looking forward to seeing sean again. Dave Jeff Brenner, of course, local staple here. American pinball fame. Dave's arcade fame now, I guess. He will be there. Who else we got? Tim Lee. Tim Lee and his wife, Amy Armstrong Lee, will be flying in from Pittsburgh to be here with us at MGC. Really looking forward to seeing Amy and I guess Tim as well. Who else? Jeff LaGrange. He is the guy who's almost never on Facebook. He's a local guy here. He brought some really cool games. I think I talked about them for the MGC we had in the fall. He redid this old Bally Kiss machine that has these awesome speakers as like a topper with new sounds, great music, system bumps. It's actually a really, really cool machine. So he brought, I think he brought eight of them because he's local here in the Milwaukee area. So really hoping he brings a bunch of games, but I'll be reaching out to him to see. Who else have we got? We got, oh, Billy YJ. Billy YJ is coming all the way from Atlanta. So Billy YJ, we are super excited. This will be the second time I've met him in person and really looking forward to hanging out with him for that weekend. And let's see, moving down the list here, we got Christopher Franchi. Nobody knows if he's going to be here because he's kind of being mysterious again. So, you know, after our little make-up session, make-out session at TBF, haven't heard from him, but, you know, he might show up. So I'll reach out to him and see if we can find that out. Going down the list, where are we at? We are at 35, Rachel Risto. So she is running the, she offered to run the pinball tournament for MGC because I guess they didn't have anybody, and she's been doing awesome. And she's a veteran now. I mean, she has been, I don't know how many tournaments she's run, but, you know, she kind of spearheads her own. But she offered to do this one, and there's a lot of people volunteering to bring games for the tournament. And, yeah, she's on fire when it comes to that tournament stuff. Tribe number 36, Jeremy Schmitz, a local guy. We talk about him all the time. He will certainly be there. Jesse J., we will miss you from Australia because she's not coming. Jesse J. and I were supposed to get together for a podcast. I was hoping this was going to be the one, but, you know, we said we were going to do it. We tried nailing down a time. I sent out some times, and now the ball's in her court. So if we don't have a Jesse J. and Drew podcast, that is, I'm going to say it, Jesse, it's on you now because I'm here. I'm podcasting and you're not. So I'm free. I'm free most of the time, Jesse. Come find me. You know where I'm at. 414-828-3739. Tony Scoots. Bring those cannolis, man. Tony Scoots coming up from Chicago. He's the owner of Scudero's Bakery down in Melrose outside of Chicago. Great cannolis, great food. I really did message him because I don't eat a lot of sweets these days. but man, those fricking cannolis. Ooh, man. Um, bring those fucking cannolis, man. Um, Stephen Silver. Did we, no, I don't, Multimorphic's not coming. Um, I can't say it definitively, but another one I got to reach out to. I don't think he's going to be there. Uh, and then we are at the end of the list cause Amy Lee is number 44 and we already discussed her. So anyways, That's a pretty good rundown of some of the peeps that are going to be there. And, of course, there's going to be lots of other great people I want to see that aren't tribe members. While we're talking about people, it's on my mind, so I'm just going to congratulate Matt McCarty. He is a local player here in the Green Bay area by District 82, plays in a lot of tournaments. He's a great pinball player. He just became ranked in the top 100 in the world. So, insert applause. Matt McCarty, congratulations man I know he listens to the show we're super proud of you he's a good dude and a great player and that's just super super awesome when you can be ranked that high being in the top I think Rachel now, she said she's in the top thousand or top couple hundred which is great and she's moving up the ranks so we're looking forward to seeing what she can do in the future but yeah Matt McCarty top 100 that's that's great we're you know wisconsin's really starting to pump out some some great players we also have david deluga he's been in the top 100 for some time i think he's even on the top like 25 or 30 um you know the the graphs of course tom graph and his son neil graph um lots lots of great players i don't follow it that closely but um you know i i root for my wisconsin boys so and girls and i'm just really excited for all those people so congrats to that and special congrats, Matt McCarty. First time, top 100. So lots of rambling today. Like I said, not a lot of stuff going on. Nothing too pressing in particular I really want to discuss, but as always, we like talking about the people in a positive way. Tim Lee is helping a distributor in his neck of the woods in or around Pennsylvania. And I say distributor, I use that term loosely. So basically what it is, is there's a gentleman, he's owned an RV dealership for some time. So, you know, he goes to these RV shows, he sells RVs and RV accessories, sound like Hank Hill. So, you know, he's been doing this for a while. And he's also, he's a pinball guy, though. He likes pinball. And Tim had kind of I think Tim kind of pushed him convinced him to start selling you know So they contacted Multimorphic and they became one of the distributors for Multimorphic And the reason why Multimorphic thought it was great was once because they're reaching this new audience, right? Because he's not really competing with our distributors because he's not selling other pinballs or arcades or anything like that. He's just selling the P3 platform from Multimorphic. But now they can go to these like RV shows where They have all these, you know, and these guys, you know, they buy these $100,000, $200,000 RVs. Obviously, they have money. So, you know, sticking a $13,000 toy in front of them, you know, they flock to it and they love it. And then, you know, with Weird Al, so they, you know, they've been selling these. So, anyways, Tim Lee has been helping him going to these local shows, you know, in the Pennsylvania area. But they just went to Pin Brew. And I'm not sure what city it's in. You know, fact-checking, poor man's pinball stuff. Yeah, I'm definitely, I'm not going to even waste my time typing in pin brew in my browser, but, um, I know that's, that's shitty of me. I should probably do it. Okay. I did it. Uh, pin brew is in Girard, Ohio. So, you know, I'm a Midwest, Midwestern area. Anyways, they went to pin brew and, um, you know, they had an amazing time. So basically Tim goes there and he helps sell these P3s. He explains it to people, kind of gets reactions from people, gets feedback, that kind of thing, and then helps them sell these. So I think it's really cool. So he was at Pembrew, and I believe the distributor's name is Justin. Tim Lee, correct me if I'm wrong. But anyways, so very cool. But he met a fan there, and his name is Dan the Man. So a fan of our show, by the way. So check him out on Facebook, Dan the Man. Just wanted to give him a special shout-out. I don't know his last name. I did reach out to him and thanked him for listening because Tim Lee said, you know, him and his wife were very nice. They met him at the show. He was wearing our T-shirt, which I thought was great. So he's representing at Pin Brew, which I think is absolutely freaking amazing. And they took some pictures. And anyways, I just wanted to say Dan the Man and Dan the Man's wife, who I don't know your name. I apologize. But thank you for putting up with your husband's debauchery. You know, just allowing him to listen to us, it means a lot. And when I say listen to us, apparently this, and I hope I'm not embarrassing you, Dan, but it's hard to do because I don't even know his last name but you know I was told he listened to every single episode which is just it's awesome so I very much appreciate it appreciate the support and yeah special shout out to Dan the man and of course Tim Lee who's always one of the best ambassadors for even though he's a shitty friend and a shitty pinball player he's a great ambassador for PPN and Poor Man's Pinball Podcast and don't forget to check out him and Rachel Risto on Rachel Risto's Tribe Member Multiball. Tim, I officially took your name off of there. It's now just called Rachel's Tribe Member Multiball. But great, great podcast. Thank you guys for everything you do. And, you know, that's kind of what I have today. Like I said, it was a lot of rambling, a lot of different things, but I hadn't put one out in a few weeks since after I got back from TPF, and I really, once again, I wanted to do that. I'm going to be doing a few more shows with people because I enjoy that so much better even though I do sometimes like to just rant like this. But the next couple, I'm hoping to have some more guests, hopefully some other tribe members. And once again, Jesse J., that would be amazing. So reach out to me, please. If anyone else wants to be on the show, let me know. Interesting personality. If you want to drink, don't drink, do it at night, do it during the day. We can have coffee. We can have booze. You know, you let me know. It's actually two 30 right now. I'm waiting to pick up my son. So this, you know, is a little different time for me to do it, but just not a lot of work going on today. So I thought I would do this little episode. So with that, I will say this is Drew with the poor man's pinball network, poor man's pinball podcast, episode one 16. I'm sorry, episode 117 I will see you next week I can see your love restrained Darling, when I hold you Don't you know I feel the same Nothing lasts forever And we both know hearts can change And it's hard to hold a candle In the cold November rain Been through this such a long, long time Just trying to kill the pain Oh, yeah Love will always come and love will always go And no one's really sure who's letting go today Walking away It really takes the time to lay it on the line I could rest my head just knowing that you were mine Oh, mine If you wanna love me Then darling, don't be afraid I'll just end up walking In the cold November rain Do you need some time on your own? Do you need some time all alone? Everybody needs some time on their own Don't you know you need some time all alone? I know it's hard to keep an open heart When even friends seem out to harm you